Nothing can ever be certain about the element of uncertainty in sport, but you can never go far wrong by suggesting at the outset of a series that New Zealand will be far better by the end of it. And so it was that all the nasty little problems that England exposed in the first Test in Auckland were solved down the road in Hamilton.

The All Blacks had yielded yards at the scrum and maul at Eden Park; not at Waikato Stadium. Their midfield had had problems with the axis of Freddie Burns, Kyle Eastmond and Manu Tuilagi; not here. All holes were plugged and in the final encounter, Ma’a Nonu was back to his best, even without the Socrates of the game, Conrad Smith, alongside him. In the wise one’s place, Malakai Fekitoa made his first start and looked sensational.

Stuart Lancaster, having plonked Tuilagi on the wing for the second Test, reverted to the combination that had done so well at the outset. Within minutes at Hamilton, Julian Savea was looking to complete a hat-trick and the England coach’s reversion looked ill-judged. The centres were tightly packed and Chris Ashton – never the granite in a cliff-face defence – was pulled inwards with them. The All Blacks simply went wide and Savea was two tries to the good.

It wasn’t simply a question of choosing the wrong players. A tour of New Zealand saps the strength like no other rugby experience and England looked off the pace and sluggish of thought from the start. Errors flowed in the first three minutes and it was hardly any wonder that Savea – with a pick-up off his toes, that Aaron Cruden, a foot shorter and the deliverer of the awkward pass, would have been proud of – set the scoreboard ticking.

This is a flavour of the opening contributions that will best be reviewed by the weary tourists in fast-forward: Burns didn’t make the 10-yard line with his kick-off; the forwards, not for the first time, failed to take a 22 dropout; Burns missed a penalty; Mike Brown took the ball back into his 22 and then kicked it straight out; Ashton missed a tackle on Aaron Smith and Brown missed the last on Savea.

The list amounts to more errors in a tiny section of the game than England would expect to make in 80 minutes. A tired group was heading for a drubbing. Savea’s second – following a lineout from another England failure to take a restart – and two by Aaron Smith set up one of those second halves of incomparable cruelty, in which the All Blacks make a declaration of intent about more serious matters ahead.

That it didn’t happen speaks volumes about the fortitude of Chris Robshaw’s England team. And perhaps a little too about a lack of clear thinking in the All Blacks. Instead of keeping their work forthright they turned a little flippant, going for the outrageous over the simple. It is mesmerising when it works, but on a slippery surface and against a defence that was hugely reinforced by the introduction of Luther Burrell, New Zealand were losing the second half until in the very last play the wonderful Savea completed his three‑try collection.

In this half of redemption against all odds, Ben Youngs rediscovered his sharpness of foot. His running became incisive and the side-step that took him far enough past Ben Smith allowed him to find Tuilagi in the build-up to Marland Yarde’s try. The finish by the wing was a counter-balance to his defence. Cory Jane is a wonderful player, but, like Ashton on Savea, Yarde failed to bring his man down too often.

As England recovered, Yarde was involved more and more in what he does better than tackle. He ran hard and honestly, but his eyes never looked beyond a determined stare down the middle of the pitch. Wingers by birthright are allowed to think of themselves and their tally of tries first, but on the opposite side Jane, Ben Smith and even Savea going for his hat-trick, flashed looks left and right, working out possibilities for runners other than themselves. That they tended to go for the fanciful delivery shouldn’t outweigh their willingness to be suppliers as well as finishers, part of the whole and not individuals.

Out of the inevitable defeat, certain individuals conversely did shine. Courtney Lawes made the one single positive contribution of the first half – a steal at a ruck – and tackled and leapt to the very end. Considering he was not an automatic selection, with Joe Launchbury and Geoff Parling ahead of him, he disguised his disappointment admirably and played himself back into serious contention.

Danny Cipriani added something when he came off the bench, where he may not have been best pleased to find himself. The All Blacks took a particular delight in smashing him on a couple of occasions, but he delivered after the crunch and kept probing at high pace. He is different – and different may well have its place in the 18 months ahead.

Others suffered. If New Zealand liked tackling Cipriani they loved hitting Dylan Hartley, once one of their own. It comes, as the hooker knows full well, with the territory. But Hartley had a difficult evening and will be left ruing his contribution to a tour that began with huge promise, but ended with little more to applaud than bravery.

Tours of New Zealand have not infrequently ended with less than that, and sometimes a sharp reminder of how much work remains to be done before the World Cup in England serves the greater purpose. But for the moment, a series lost 3-0 will hurt the minds of players nursing weary bodies. What is absolutely certain in their uncertain world is that those who sport these all‑over bruises deserve a good break.